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Draft:Solomon Radasky
---- Early Life Solomon Radasky was born in Warsaw, Poland on May 17, 1910 but grew up in the city smaller city of Praga, which was across the Vistula river. He and his direct family were of Jewish heritage which consisted of his mother, father, two brothers, Moishe and Baruch, and three sisters: Sarah, Rivka and Leah. Solomon came to own a small tailor shop where he made fur coats as a living. Their life was as normal and happy as anyone else’s until everything changed in 1941. World War II, the Warsaw Ghetto and the Nazi Camps Solomon’s life was forever altered once the Holocaust began. One morning in 1941, Solomon awoke as he did every day, got ready for work, and proceeded to walk to his shop. He came across some German police on his way who arrested him on the spot in the street. As a successful 31 year old, law-abiding, Jewish, citizen and businessman, he of course had no idea why this was happening. His family was also taken, and together they found themselves forced into the Warsaw Ghetto by the Germans. There they discovered it was a roundup of all Jewish people among other “undesirables” targeted by the Nazi government which include, but are not limited to, Soviet citizens and POW’s, Poles, Serbs, the disabled, Homosexuals and Jehovah’s Witnesses. At first, Radasky was forced to clear snow from the railroad tracks in order to keep the trains running, but he was an efficient worker and built up a good reputation among the German soldiers. Eventually he disclosed his prior career as a tailor and they moved him to a shop where he made jackets for the German Officers. His father, mother and elder sister were all killed in the ghetto. His mother and sister were shot on the spot when some Germans asked her if she had any jewelry and she said no. His father was caught smuggling food at the gates, and shot in consequence. On April 19th, 1943, the Warsaw Uprising began, and was fought for 63 days which was the longest operation conducted by any European resistance group during World War II. One speculation of why it did not succeed is that the Red Army temporarily halted combat operations which allowed the Germans to re-organize and retaliate against the Poles. Many people were killed and Radasky himself was shot in the ankle. Following the uprising, the Germans started moving the Jews and others to work and death camps. Solomon’s remaining two sisters and brothers were put on a train to Treblinka, and he was put on a train to Majdanek. They were separated because Treblinka could only receive 10,000 prisoners in one trip, and there were around 20,000 total. He never saw them again. At Majdanek, Radasky was forced to walk barefoot three kilometers to and from work every day. His ankle was still healing from his gunshot wound, which a former doctor in the camp was able to operate on with only a pocket knife. He could not limp at all, however, for fear of being removed from his job and killed with the others who could not work (women, children, elderly, sick etc). Once another worker smoked a cigarette and a German officer saw the smoke. He came riding around on his horse and demanded to know who did it; nobody answered. He then selected 10 “dogs” as they called them, because they wore tags with numbers, to be hanged, including Radasky. They were in the gallows with the noose fastened around their necks, seconds away from being executed, when another German soldier screamed “Halt!” He possessed documents containing orders for three groups of 750,000 workers to be transferred to other camps; Radasky was part of that second group. He was subsequently transferred to Auschwitz. Upon arriving at Auschwitz, there was a selection process in which some people were selected to be machine gunned in a field. Radasky was selected to be a worker and was taken to get a number tattooed on his arm (128232). After the process he was sent to work at numerous camps including Buna, Gross-Rosen, and Dachau. The Americans kept getting closer and closer to the camps so the Germans put everyone onto trains into the mountains. Finally on May 1st, 1945, The Americans caught up to the train outside a small town named Tutzing and liberated the prisoners. Post War and Later Life Once rejuvenated back to good health, Radasky headed to a town in Germany named Feldafing which was a known place to look for missing persons. Many liberated people went there after the war in hopes of finding friends and family. He found an old friend whose girlfriend’s family were former patrons of his shop. He was then introduced to her friend, Frieda, who became his wife in November of 1946. They had a son born May 13th, 1948, the day before the state of Israel was created. They were able to move to the United States in 1949 and settled in New Orleans, Louisiana. He could not speak any English, but was able to demonstrate his knowledge and skill at a local fur shop working for fifty cents an hour. Out of the 78 people in his extended family, Solomon was the only survivor of the Holocaust. He lived in New Orleans with his two children and his wife until August 4, 2002, when he passed away at the age of 92. References